


Indulgence

by felinefelicitations



Category: Hades (Video Game 2018)
Genre: Blood and Injury, Body Dysphoria, F/M, Gentleness, Hands, Happy Ending, Kidnapping, Love at First Sight, Minor Violence, POV Multiple, Pre-Canon, Romance, Shapeshifting, Suicidal Thoughts, but i am obliged to warn, nonsexual voyuerism, that one is very very brief, this fic is extremely not as edgy as these tags make it sound
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-18
Updated: 2021-01-18
Packaged: 2021-03-15 23:07:15
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,396
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28821204
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/felinefelicitations/pseuds/felinefelicitations
Summary: The thing about love, of course, is after the initial wonder fades, it is achoice. Aphrodite gets blamed for anawfullot of heartbreak that is not actually her fault. People do so love to pretend they are powerless, that she controls the tides of their hearts, when really, she just gives them a little push.As pretty as Ares' heart was, it alone would not sustain the feeling in her breast. It is so terribly tacky to indulge in oneself, what one is, and it would be painful, yes, to uproot the emotion he had planted in her, but she could do it.She would have, once.
Relationships: Aphrodite/Ares (Hades Video Game)
Comments: 33
Kudos: 77





	Indulgence

**Author's Note:**

> i couldn't _not_ write Aphrodite's POV on Ares after writing "Bad for the Rest"--i wanted to give her voice, i love her too much
> 
> i hope you do too.
> 
> (there is no source for the bit with primordial eros & dite; just a personal headcanon)

Aphrodite does not, on the whole, indulge in love. Oh, she samples it, allows herself the occasional tenderness, the quickly snuffed out spark of new interest, those little deaths of _course_ , but really, it's a little _tacky_ to truly get lost in oneself. And it is _very_ important to remember that does not mean she has no _passion_ , because while she might not indulge in love, she _very much_ indulges in passion, her most favourite vice. There's something just so undeniably _exciting_ about getting properly enthralled with a new project, a new person, a new skill, a new war. All of that aside, that fine little distinction neatly put away—

" _Ares_ ," she all but sings, holding her arms out.

Ares smiles, still smelling of blood and sweat and smoke, and the spear in his hand vanishes as he lowers himself for her, the armor slipping away to only the thigh-length tunic beneath as his large hands carefully pull her close. Aphrodite sighs pleased as he lays his head against her breast, feels all that swirling emotion in him settle, feels him lighten just a bit in her arms from so much blood to a color very near her own. Holds him close and rests her face against his hair.

He is large, her Ares, and gentle. So gentle.

"Welcome home," she says and listens to how his heart sings at the words, still her favourite tune in all of Gaia.

"Thank you," he says, so sincere, so humble, so _genuine_ it glows.

—everything put aside, Aphrodite _loves_ Ares. He is why she exists on Gaia at all.

It's such a pity how _often_ she has to remind people of that little fact.

**

She is not, like all the other Olympian gods, Gaia descended. They like to say she has no parents, that she was birthed from seafoam, but the truth of the matter is Aphrodite very much does have parents. A parent, singular, she named her son after.

She was not Gaian, did not have a shape, not really—she had been born in all the light and love of Eros' oceans. When she visited Gaia to see what those Gaian gods were up to, the sea was the boundary to home, a place she could exist. It was by the sea she first saw Ares.

It was _not_ love at first sight. And technically, as Ares did not see her, she is not lying. Ares does so hate to be lied to.

It was a discovery.

It was a god not at peace but something like it, pulse steady and beating in time with the crash of the waves. It was a god lounging at the sea's edge, leaning back on his elbows and breathing easy, legs just apart enough to show the inside of his thighs. It was a god, head tilted back and eyes mostly closed, not at rest but something like it, trying to find something like it, as the sea licked at his feet and ankles before drawing back again.

Aphrodite very nearly touched, very nearly followed the tide to brush herself along the inside of one calf, to trail seafoam around an ankle, and see if this resting Gaian god might notice.

She'd never heard a heart song so sweet, so deep, on Gaia. So _steady_.

She thought she might understand why the tides moved here.

"Ares!" a sunbeam god called, and Ares opened red eyes and Aphrodite shrank back within the depths, away from where she had been drifting closer to the shore, closer to one foot outstretched in the surf.

Watched quiet as Ares smiled, head turning and his pulse, steady as the tides, sped up, watched as what little peace he'd managed to find slipped his grasp, as that beating heart was set alight again and _oh_ , Aphrodite had never before found a well that ran so deep as the one in this god on the shore, smiling at his brother. So _pure_.

"Hermes," Ares greeted, and rose.

Aphrodite watched them go, watched them fall in step, and wanted, desperately, for Ares to come back.

**

He did come back. Not often, not often enough for her tastes, but often enough. He would come back blood drenched, come back smelling of smoke. He would come back restless, heart howling fury. He would come back with clouds as dark as his skin, eyes sparking, so much tension as he paced along the shore. Brooding.

Always, that steady beat in his breast—deep, endlessly so, that made her want to _touch_. To have shape.

He would come back, her Ares who wasn't hers yet, and he would pace, would let slip that fine control he arrived with, and then, once his anger eased—not spent, never spent—settle where the sea touched sand, a foot outstretched, and breathe in time with the waves until his heartbeat slowed, eased, as he found peace, as he tried to find peace or something like it.

He seemed so awfully tired, in those moments he finally, finally went still, but he never slept. Just lazed.

Aphrodite was quite sure she would hate him if he opened his mouth. Hoped she would, in truth. But he did not open his mouth—he lazed until he grew tired of it or his brother Hermes fetched him or his other brother, Apollo, came to argue with him, and Aphrodite drifted near in the sea listening to the loveliest song she'd ever found away from home. Listened to it shift higher, brighter, when Hermes arrived, so like a dolphin's endless joy at finding a ship to bound in the wake of. Listened to it speed, spark, when Apollo arrived full of vitriol, the excitement of a shark scenting blood.

He loved Hermes and Apollo both so genuinely it almost set him glowing; Aphrodite would retreat before she reached out, every time, and wonder what his song would sound like for her.

**

The thing about love, of course, is after the initial wonder fades, it is a _choice_. Aphrodite gets blamed for an _awful_ lot of heartbreak that is not actually her fault. People do so love to pretend they are powerless, that she controls the tides of their hearts, when really, she just gives them a little push.

As pretty as Ares' heart was, it alone would not sustain the feeling in her breast. It is so terribly tacky to indulge in oneself, what one is, and it would be painful, yes, to uproot the emotion he had planted in her, but she could do it.

She would have, once.

One afternoon, hearing him drawing near, she shaped herself into a seafoam white goose, one wing pricked by the thorns that grew thick on his island, and laid herself upon the shore. It was foolish, oh so foolish, a spur of the moment choice that would doom her as thoroughly as the doom he gave and gives so many, and yet still never—

Ares paused, frowned at the goose sitting upon the shore. A fine creature, the goose, and this one especially so—all white, large as the ones at his mother's hall. It hissed at him, one wing held awkward, and aha—thorns. It must have stumbled through one of the briar patches he had laid so thick around his retreat.

It happened, from time to time.

"Enough of that," he told the bird, approaching, and was quick to grab it. A second pair of hands would have made the task easier, but it was not the first time he had ever needed to pluck thorns out. He laughed when it bit at his side—it was very nearly like childhood again.

He liked geese—they had so much spirit to them.

Ares finished removing the thorns, made sure the bleeding was staunched before it could be a problem, then allowed the goose to go, being sure to step back before it could attempt to bite or smack him with a wing.

"Watch where you roam," he advised.

The goose twisted its head back and forth, eyeing him, and then took flight.

—never still has she ever quite regretted it.

He is so gentle, her Ares; how little it is remembered.

**

Aphrodite did not have a shape her own, not the way those who lived on Gaia would understand, but the memory of Ares' hands… she desired whatever his hands might shape of her, so long as his hands did the shaping, so long as his were the hands holding her.

It was horrible, truly the most horrid experience of her life.

She does not indulge in love, and yet she was so terribly in love with him. They had never spoken, not properly. Perhaps she might still hate him, or better achieve disinterest, if they spoke.

(She could not forget his laughter, how quick he was to aid.)

The next time she heard him approach, she shaped herself a dove and hid between rocks, white breast nearly too small to contain the anticipation, the memory of hands, the hope he would be cruel

(the terror he might)

so she could be free of herself. So she could choose differently.

He came brooding, he came with dark clouds and eyes sparking. He came not with blood and smoke but a wound to his heart that had him furious, too furious to calm. It was not how she had anticipated him arriving; she did not know if she should reveal herself at all. It would be foolish—his is a fury to start a war, after all, a passion Aphrodite knows quite well.

Before she could decide, Apollo came. Not with sharp words; he stepped from a bit of light glinting off the sea, spoke too low for her to hear, but it made Ares stop pacing, made him snarl and lunge, control snapping, and the two of them fell to a brawl that, when it was done, had them both bruised and bleeding on the shore and…

laughing.

Peace or something like it hummed through Ares as he sat next to his brother; Apollo smiled with his eyes. The two brothers lounged a while, not speaking but instead simply watching the waves break upon the sand and rock, the sunlight off the water, the few crabs startled from slumber scampering away from piper birds. When they did speak, it was too low and indistinct for her to make out where she was hidden between the rocks. She wished she could draw closer; she wished she had not shaped herself a dove but instead stayed within the sea, but she has never had the gift for knowing what will come.

She settled for resting atop one of the black rocks she was hiding between, sunning herself the way she had seen other doves do, and watched them half-dozing, listening to heartsong and starsong pulse in time. There was nothing to suggest her anything but a dove resting awhile before continuing her journey.

Eventually, Apollo stood to bid his brother farewell. His gaze was hot as it lingered on her; Aphrodite tilted her head, as any bird might when observed and deciding if it should flee, but did not immediately take flight.

Ares twisted to look.

"A dove here?" Ares chuckled. "Does that mean anything?"

"It could," Apollo said. "Ask Hermes."

Ares snorted, looked away, stretched a foot out so the water could clasp his ankle as it swept onto the shore.

"Perhaps I will. Farewell, Apollo."

"Stay well, Ares," Apollo said; the light shifted and he was gone, leaving only Ares lounging. He turned to consider her again.

Aphrodite sank down into her feathers; it was not only the sun heating her blood, her form, and she worried she might vanish into mist once more if his gaze kept lingering so.

But he turned away again, eyes drifting half closed, listening to the waves and the cries of distant sea birds. Aphrodite stayed in that gentle quiet until he left at last and she could flee back to the spray and sea and try to figure out how she could possibly say a word to him when even his gaze alone set her so aflutter.

**

It is not so hard a trick, sparking affection. It is not so hard to make the mind see the light striking hair, to consider the tense of muscle beneath skin, to nudge eyes to land on a pulse fluttering under thin skin easily broken, easily kissed. It is not so hard to drown a heart at all—not even the gods are immune to the depths Aphrodite holds sway over.

Ares' heart would have been so easily swayed, if she had chosen that, but she would have always known. It would not have been _love_.

Love is a choice. Many choices.

She rested a dove on the rocks each time he came, once his pulse had eased as much as he could manage.

"Ah, it is our little dove," Ares would comment, or "Surely there is another island that would suit you better, little dove."

And once—

"You again, little dove. How is your rock today?" Ares asked, noticing the dove fluttering onto the rock she seemed most partial to sunning on.

"Quite lovely, dearest," the dove said, tilting her head to the side, all of her feathers fluffing.

Ares blinked, but a talking bird is not so odd a thing to a god. He had, to some extent, suspected his erstwhile guest not only just a bird.

"How is your beach?" the dove asked.

She had a lovely voice, the dove. Sweet, full of humour.

A tension he had not realized he had been holding in his shoulders eased.

"Pleasant," he said.

He should be alarmed, he knew, but. He should be alarmed by that _but_ as well, yet.

The dove cooed, a trilling little purr, fluffed further, eyes closing, and he could not bring himself to care for an alarm that was not sounding.

**

They began to speak more often—at first only greetings, little niceties. Aphrodite did not dare to think he might love a bird even as she listened to the song in his breast for any change. They spoke shy, both cautious, and Aphrodite tried to stem the flood of words that swelled on her tongue, all the questions and stories and little comments—desperate to know him, desperate to not be known, knowing her words would reveal, expose, as much as his.

Could not help revealing herself anyway.

"What do you love so dearly?" she asked one day he arrived full of joy, triumph, a victory howl. "You are such a tempest today, little god."

He laughed.

"Myself," he told her. Not still, but settled on the sand anyway, restless as a stallion newly sprung from the sea. His eyes sparked, his smile slipped wider. Laughter threatened to break again—how she wanted that laughter, nearly as beautiful as his heartsong. How rare he let it slip.

"Tell me," she asked, fluttered closer than she had yet dared.

"I do not think it would much interest you, little dove," he said, and though his smile did not fade, it did leave his eyes a bit. A little control slipping back in.

"It would," Aphrodite said, but this—whatever he was, it was a thing he loved, yet a thing he knew others did not. Her words only made his smile dim, quieted the victory in him.

She was desperate to know; to reveal that desperation would reveal in turn.

"Please," she pleaded again, and fluttered to land by his hand resting on the sand. "Darling, your joy brings me joy. Tell me, and I will give you my name."

Ares looked at her by his hand, red eyes unblinking, and though she wanted to pull back, to hide, she did not. She wished she had a god shape, so she might stamp a foot for emphasis.

(So she might cradle his face in her hands, might shape him as he had shaped her.)

"You do not need to give me your name," Ares said at last. "But allow me to hold you, if you wish to know."

He held out a hand. He has such large hands, her Ares, calloused and scarred and worn; hands that work. Hands that break ground, that tend, hands full of so much strength. Aphrodite hesitated only a moment, but she had already flown so near—what was this last little bit of space?

(She had already given him her heart.)

He frowned when she landed in his hand, lifted her to look at her close. His skin was warm, heart quiet—not still, only guarded. Aphrodite did not flinch away, though she did startle when he lifted his other hand, brushed a knuckle against one cheek.

"You are such a brave little thing," Ares said. And—

"You will not like this," he told her, this little dove he did not wish to drive away. He had enjoyed their talks, enjoyed her wit, her humour, her endearments. He had not been endeared, before.

"That is rather for me to decide, don't you think?" she sniffed, imperious little thing. Brave little thing.

Ares would miss her company.

"As you say," he said.

—he began to speak. To tell her of a war he had planted the seeds of long ago that had finally come to fruition, one that had needed such careful tending. He tried at first, her Ares who was not hers yet, to stay vague, to skirt details, but his joy—in himself, his love of himself—was in the act, not the abstract.

She pecked his palm, beat her wings once.

" _Tell_ me," Aphrodite said, petulant. She might have stamped. "Ares, this is all so dry."

It startled him; a crack in his guard.

"Ares," she half sang, flapping her wings again.

Aphrodite wanted to _know_ ; she was sat in his palm, he could crush her, but she would take that chance a dozen times over if only to have his song all for her, his joy all for her.

"What do you _love,_ Ares?" she cooed his name a third time, she trilled; she set in the words every siren call she knew to draw out passions buried deep.

"You are a horrible little dove.” He scowled, his defense cracking with all his feral fury, but the words and call were already sung before he could ward against them.

Aphrodite preened in his palm, and finally, finally he began to _tell_ her, to say. To speak of smoke and blood; to speak of bone shattering, of marrow; to speak of passion driven out, of separating bravery from cowardice. Of a harvest all gore and guts and glory that he, of all those Gaian gods, knows best.

Oh, how it made his heart _sing_. How his eyes lit up; how, as he gave up trying to fight against her charm, his smile began to return; how his teeth flashed sharp and a chuckle, low, rumbled threat of joyous storms while he detailed first one battle, then another, detailed how delicate this war had been to foster; how his smile eased and he found peace or something like it in the recollection of himself—his ability, his skill, his _passion_.

"There," he finally said, still smiling just a little. "Are you satisfied, little dove?"

“Oh, Ares,” she sighed, melting in his palm all feather and mist and seaspray. It was so hard to remember shape when surrounded by a love that ran so deep, so true, so _genuine_. “You must show me next time, darling, you simply must.”

Ares blinked.

“I believe I misheard you,” he said, cupping her in both hands as she struggled to find a form again, spilled half sea and all tender light.

“But I did not stutter at all,” Aphrodite sang, twined herself around his fingers, along the pulse in his wrist. Oh, how sweetly his heart beat, how gentle its tune. How vast his wonder. “You must, it sounds so marvelous. Imagine, so much passion spilled upon the fields, why—I’ve never heard of anything so delightful, anything so beautiful. Just the once, Ares, and I will not trick you at all, not this time. Don’t make me beg, dear, it’s so unbecoming to make a lady beg.”

Ares eyes were so wide, so surprised, and there, just barely—a shift in his heartsong. Delicate, bright, bright, _bright_. One drop, a second, a flood of emotion spilling up, out; a love as deep, as endless, as the one she called home. As gold, as true.

She would stay, for that song, for him. She would have a home in him, so long as he had that ocean in his chest.

“What may I call you?” he asked as she flitted between light and water in his hands, around hands she would allow to shape her, hold her, keep her.

“Aphrodite,” she said.

“Thank you,” he said, first, and then, careful, “Thank you, Aphrodite.”

Oh, how strange her name sounded on his tongue. How wondrous. How perfect—truly, no one had ever spoken her name with so much reverence.

(Still, no one has, though a few mortals have come close.)

“Ares,” she sang to watch him smile, to hear his heart sing. “ _Ares_.”

He laughed, caught out of him, deep as the depths he held, rough as the storms that chased his shadow, gentle...

gentle as his hands that cradled her.

“I will grow you a proper war,” he promised. “You will have to be patient. I will not show you some sickly thing.”

“Of course, of course. You must only come back to visit.”

“I will,” Ares promised, her Ares that was _hers_. “As often as I might.”

“That is enough,” Aphrodite sighed, settled in his palms again. She managed, at last, to shape herself a dove once more, cooed as he stroked her back, pressed her face against his touch as he pet her cheek again.

“You are a marvel, little dove,” he sighed and there—

Quiet.

He sat on the shore, this goddess light and mist and feather resting in his hands, and listened. Listened to the waves. Listened to her sighs. Listened to sea birds cry. Listened to… everything. The world.

Listened to the sound of silence.

Stayed quiet, still, until the sun began to set, sky cast bloody, then pink, then night unfolded her cloak over them both.

He would need to go. He would not have one of his brothers come looking for him and break this peace. Would not resent them for breaking it.

He would, but it had been so long. He had forgotten so much more than he thought. He would need to go but—

—Ares set her down upon the sand.

”Come back soon,” Aphrodite said, again, and pretended she was not begging.

“I will,” he said. “You have given me a gift, and I would give you a thousand in return.”

"I do not need a thousand, you ridiculous god, only you."

He smiled soft at that, smiled true.

"Farewell, Ares," she sighed.

"Stay well, Aphrodite," he said.

She let herself spill apart once he was gone, let herself be pushed and carried on the waves, and quiet, careful, with no one to hear, sang her own song.

It is so terribly tacky, to indulge in oneself, but what is a life lived without that finest indulgence of all?

**

Ares came back as he could. Sometimes his brothers came as well. Aphrodite did not speak to them, only hid in Ares' shadow or settled a distance away on a rock. She would listen and watch and wait for them to leave.

They loved Ares, his brothers, though not the way Ares loved them.

Ares came back and they spoke, the two of them, of his wars and his passions. Aphrodite dared to tell him a little of her home, those golden oceans all light and love, taught him the trick of using a name to snare a heart—though he, of course, was far more skilled at provoking fury and courage than love and lust. Still, it gave him joy, the trick, which brought her joy in turn. He loved himself so, and yet still had so much depth to love others so wholly. To love her.

She wondered aloud once if he might ask her take a shape like the ones he knew for Gaian gods.

"What right would I have?" Ares asked, so genuine it set him glowing, as light edges storm clouds silver. So sincere, so humble. "I am not given to hypocrisy, dear 'Dite, surely you have realized that."

"Of course, silly," Aphrodite said, and wondered if she might finally discover she could drown after all. She felt she might. "I was only musing." She let herself slip mist and light knowing he would catch her.

If he were not himself, if he had demanded it, she would not have allowed herself to love him; yet, that very same quality meant she was left longing for his hands to shape her even as he did not, even as he only held the truth of her so tenderly.

She would shape herself a god shape for him. It would be difficult. It would hurt. It would need blood, and she might be different after. This time, perhaps, this time, perhaps, _this_ time...

...but she did not.

He came to visit as he could, her Ares. He told her of the war he was growing for her, he told her of wolves and vultures, he told her of Keres and of his brother's arrows that never missed and his other brother's lies shaped clever as gossamer gold. His heart sang for her her favorite tune and once his words slowed she would sing his name sweetly and give him that peace he sought so desperately because it was the best she could do, could offer, and still so little in comparison to the ocean he kept safe for her.

He visited, her Ares, he visited and he visited and then

he

stopped.

Aphrodite did not realize, at first. His visits were irregular as the clouds, irregular as storms, yet the moon swelled then swelled again then swelled again then swelled again again again _again_ —

he snarled; dark too dark even for he to see, chains biting skin; tried to twist free

—he did not come.

She could sense him, of course, he had an ocean in his chest all for her, but she had never risked leaving the sea. Perhaps it was a careful bit of diplomacy that needed faltering, perhaps a famine, perhaps—

there was a dull ache set in his shoulders; it was too dark for even his eyes; he tried to tear to rend to break, blood slicking, perhaps enough to lubricate, but it worked as little as it had the first, the last, all of his tries; fury ate his breast until the chains squeezed tighter again, feasted; he gasped in breath, shivering and staring in a dark he could not see and bit back the scream trying to shred his throat

—any number of things.

He yet had his ocean; he yet loved her, her Ares. She would wait, because he always, always—

it was not quiet, none of him was quiet, yet he could not _think_ ; he was so tired, exhausted; to struggle was to feed the chains, to not struggle was to feed them slower; to not struggle went against all that he was, yet to burn himself out… Hermes would notice, Apollo, one of them, 'Dite, _Aphrodite_ , she would be waiting he _must_ be still, hold

—returned.

**

She waited.

**

She stirred one day from waiting, could not place why, then—

he couldn't remember the sound of the sea; it did not matter

—realized.

Ares' song was silent.

Aphrodite pulled herself from the sea, shaped herself a dove and flew deep into the woods of Ares' sacred island, flew until she could barely hear the water and then went still herself. Tried to still her heart, racing thoughts, tried to go quiet, and _listened_.

She could sense it, distant and small, the ocean in his chest, but his song—

could remember sunlight on waves, could remember laughter; he thought of these things, not fury not rage; he was so _tired_ , thin, _worn_

—was too soft.

She opened her eyes again.

Aphrodite had never dared leave the sea before. She was a daughter of Eros, light and water; she did not know what would happen if she ventured deep into Gaia's physicality, that grinding binding earth.

Ares' song was too quiet.

She had a home, so long as he had that ocean in his chest. Surely she could risk it. Surely.

There was a noise, cursing and she flinched away as sunbeam and shadow sliced through the wood—

"There you are," Hermes said. "I was hoping to find you."

The not-a-dove looked as if she might take flight.

"Need your help, don't make this difficult," Hermes said. "I know you can talk, Eros child, can we skip the bit where you're shy?"

(Surely she would know—Eros children could find any heart, or so Apollo always said. Hermes didn't much trust light other than the sun, but _Apollo said_.)

"Time's wasting, time has _been_ wasting, wasting every second you play coy, let's go," he added. If she tried to fly, he could catch her, he could catch anything, but he couldn't _find_ anything—any _one_ , and wasn't that crux of the problem, that he couldn't find Ares, _somehow_ , that storm god war god that loud god who howled brightest, who gave him such fabulous gifts, that god who had never hidden, and something must be _wrong_ ; Ares would brood but not like _this_ , never like—

"Go where?" Aphrodite asked, but she knew before he opened his mouth as she watched this sunbeam god flicker and ripple restless energy and light and shadow.

"Ares, where else? He's missing, please tell me you noticed, let's—"

"He's inland, very far," Aphrodite interrupted. "Very, very far."

"Oh," Hermes said, sunbeam god—but flesh, but bone and blood and all those parts of Gaia that made _real_ , too. Not like Aphrodite. "Hm. That's what he meant."

"Who?"

"No one," Hermes lied. "Will you show me anyway? You have to choose."

Aphrodite did not know what would happen. She could not hear Ares' song with Hermes before her; she could only distantly sense his heart at all. Enough to find it.

Enough to show the way.

(Gaia takes and binds and makes physical even the air; it is who she is, just as Chaos chance and Nyx endings and Eros light—those not born of Gaia cannot stay long in her except at the boundaries. The sea, the underworld, the sky.)

"Yes," Aphrodite said.

(To linger is to lose the self.)

It's a choice, love. An act.

(She loves him, her Ares who is hers. He gave her an ocean all for her.)

They both launched into the air—a crow and dove, an odd omen if ever there was one—and Aphrodite took the lead, flying towards another ocean she hoped would be enough to keep her true.

**

Ares was inland, very far.

Very, very far.

"I've got you," Hermes said, that boundary guide.

Aphrodite had never _needed_ to breathe before. It hurt. Her pulse was loud, too red. There were bones in her, too fixed.

All of her was so tired, so sore. She had only known heartache before, not this fatigue that grasped at every part of her, bound her so tightly to flesh.

Hermes hands were warm, light; not home, but close. A boundary. Close enough a boundary.

 _North,_ she managed, thought she managed, but beaks were not designed to speak. It might only have come out a dove's weak cry—but Hermes, boundary guide, bird reader, did not need speech.

"Just a little longer," Hermes promised. Lied.

A kindness.

She pulled herself back up, that heavy body, and flew again. Not far—to a stone. Then a low branch. Then a shrub. A bit of sun warm earth.

Just a little longer.

A little further.

(It hurt, being real. She was the wrong shape. She _had_ a shape.)

Just a little—

"Got you," Hermes said, cradling Ares' dove in his arms, holding her as she panicked and fluttered, heart beating too fast. She stilled, heaving breath; he kept petting her until she went quiet and shivering, then only quiet and at rest. He looked down at the giants' home far below, gently scratched the dove's head.

 _Home_ , she whispered, barely formed thought.

Imagine loving someone so much.

"Yeah," Hermes said. "I'll get you there. You just rest, Eros child."

He pulled his scarf off, wrapped her in that bit of sunlight to keep her safe—not her kind of light, he knew, but close enough a boundary. Enough to keep her just a little bit unreal.

She nestled down, Ares' dove, his little bit of peace he'd somehow found, that had somehow found him, closed her eyes, and slept.

Hermes set her on his bag by a tree, considered the giants' house again, two brothers. Hermes likes brothers, brotherhoods, likes not to meddle with them so much. Nothing greater he'd ever found than his brothers who gave him such marvelous gifts.

Pity these two had _stolen_ one of _his_ brothers.

Hermes slipped down the cliff face, drew a knife, and went to find Ares.

**

Sunlight and heat, too much heat, hot.

"Be still," the sun said, irritated.

Too hot, too much, then—

Ares stirred amid fur and comfort, limbs heavy with ache. Breathed in familiar smells—ozone and sky and sun warmed stone. Memories, but no, they could not be. They stung his nose, and he opened his eyes to find Apollo.

"Be still,” Apollo said, dove in his hands struggling.

Surely he was still dreaming, preferable to consciousness and those chains draining away all that he was. He closed his eyes again—

“Rest,” the sun said.

Fur, comfort, a weight not too hot, not too cold. The steady pulse of the ocean against… her? her side.

She nestled closer, fell back to sleep.

Home.

**

Next she woke was to movement, talk.

Hermes and Apollo.

A hand, broad and calloused, on her back.

“—real to return,” Apollo said.

A hand that works, shapes, breaks, smoothing feather.

“I tried without her,” Hermes said. "I'm sorry."

A gentle hand. Her Ares’ hands are so gentle. How oft everyone forgets.

“It was her choice,” Apollo said.

A song, low and angry and bright; an ocean all for her stirred to tempest fury.

To—

“Brave little thing, isn’t she?” Ares finally said. Quiet. Still not all of himself again, not near. Enough, though. He stroked down Aphrodite’s back where she rested against his side, and wondered what he had ever done to inspire such passion in her. Such recklessness.

He would give her a thousand wars, the world, all of creation. He would give her anything she asked, and none of it would be enough for her.

Perhaps he should have let himself burn out, with this price.

—sorrow.

**

The third she woke was to the sound of the sea.

Aphrodite opened her eyes. She was resting in Ares’ arms; they were on his island once more. It felt like home and not home. Home, because she had Ares; not home, because something of this boundary space felt too…

 _wrong_.

She still felt so real. A pulse that followed a real heart, bones, muscle that tensed. Feathers that itched and were not simply there to express emotion.

There were stars dense overhead; the waves rose, broke, scattered upon the sand. A crab scurried by, disappeared behind a rock.

 _Welcome home_ Aphrodite said, or tried to say, but beaks are not made for speech and Ares not a god to understand birds.

“Hello, Aphrodite,” Ares said, thumb brushing her cheek.

She pressed her face into the touch, instead.

“You seem,” he said, so even, so calm, yet the ocean in his chest howled grief, “to have gotten stuck.”

How did birds speak? She did not know; she only knew how they behaved in stories, in poems. She stayed quiet.

“We will see what we can do,” Ares said. “But it will take time.”

He paused again and for a heartbeat his grip tensed, he shivered.

But he did not break her with his hands that break. He is so gentle, her Ares.

“Do not wander from here again, dear Aphrodite,” Ares said. “Please. I will visit as often as I may.”

Then, “Remember to eat and drink.”

He cupped her in both of his hands, lifted her. She looked at him, tilted her head back and forth. There was so much control in him; so much guarded. She pecked at his hand, dragged a chuckle from him, but he would not laugh, not then.

He would not laugh for some time.

“I would be furious, were someone to question my choice,” Ares said. “But I do still question yours. I hope you forgive me.”

He pressed a kiss to her head; she cooed, a thrum that ran through all of her, and though she might have melted mist and light and feather before, now she could only go limp. Fluff a little.

“We will think of something. We are gods,” he said before he left. “Stay well, Aphrodite.”

She sang a little for him, what she could—not her heartsong. Birds cannot sing heartsongs. But she sang her farewell anyway, and listened to his heart sing in return.

**

It was not so bad, being a bird. Sleep was very different. She startled more at shadows after one particularly terrifying run in with an owl. It was difficult to remember to eat until suddenly the hunger crept up on her all at once.

She could think though, and sing, and skim over the waves to catch spray and feel, a little, like she used to be. When Ares visited, and he visited often, it was very nearly like their old chats, the first ones, the ones when they both were yet so shy.

(It was hardest when she was alone, but birds cannot weep for what they do not know.)

But Aphrodite was not one to regret, and she did not regret her choice. The world was better for having Ares’ tune, her favourite in all creation; she was glad she had saved it.

(She flung herself into the waves, ended up spat back up on the shore, and wept and wept she was not a bird, not really.)

Being alive is a painful thing.

(She tried to spill apart again when she woke one morning and realized she had forgotten what it _felt_ like to be formless, flew into the waves again and again and again and—

“Stop that,” Apollo said, holding Ares’ dove in his hands. She flailed, pecked at his hands, and he sighed, irritated, but it was better he catch her than Ares.

 _Love_. Horrible, really, and yet.

—wanted to scream fury at the sun.

She flew to a rock when he let her go, kept her back to him and preened and pretended she had not, for a spell, tried to drown herself.

It was quiet, but for the waves. Somewhere distant, Ares.

“Just a little longer,” Apollo finally said.

Lied—or she thought he was lying. She didn’t know him, then.

She did not answer, but still… she appreciated he did not leave, either.

It was so difficult, when she was alone.

**

“So,” Hermes said. “It’s going to hurt. I mean, most deaths do, and most births even more, that’s just how boundaries work.”

Aphrodite tilted her head to look up at Ares, but he did not seem worried and so, she did not. He trusted his brother who spun such golden lies—she knew enough to know the way Hermes loved Ares.

“But it’ll make you a god like us,” Hermes added. “Which isn’t what you were, but Apollo doesn’t think there’s a way to make you what you were again.”

“You will be able to change form again,” Ares said. “At least a little.”

 _You both act as if I did not already choose,_ Aphrodite said to Hermes, because Hermes could understand her—the body language, the chirps and coos that spilled from her beak. Hermes grinned, knife-sharp.

“I like you,” Hermes said. “I like her.”

“She is magnificent,” Ares agreed, tune turning bright. Fond. “I trust you wish to try?”

That to her.

Aphrodite fluttered up to his shoulder, pressed herself to his neck, rubbed her head along his jaw.

Of course she would. She had always wanted his hands to shape her, if she must be shaped.

**

It did hurt. There was a great deal of blood, a fresh sea-spun stallion sacrificed, smoke and fire, and Hermes’ knife, too sharp, cutting her heart free and…

silence

dark

heavy and wet and wave and lungs aching for air she breathed choked, sputtered on water, salt rushing into her mouth, struggled against heavy and wet and weightless, struggled towards sunlight glinting off the surface, struggled to understand how to _swim_

hands, large and broad and gentle gentle _gentle_ , grasping her, pulling her from seafoam and spray and _drowning_ , hands that shaped her heart from the first moment they had ever laid upon her even in disguise.

She choked up more water, hair in her eyes, shaking and shivering and cold a way she had never really been, not even as a bird. Waves broke, lapped against her legs, drew back. Ares’ hands, her gentle Ares, soothed her back; Hermes’ hands, sunbeam warm, steadied her.

Apollo, bless the depths of the ocean, did not touch her.

She opened her eyes, looked at hands—her hands, she had never had hands before—splayed against Ares’ chest.

“Here,” Apollo said; she took the offered blanket gratefully. It was, she’d realize later, soft, but right then, newly born and tender and still shrinking away from the vast noise and sound and _everything_ of being a Gaian bound god, it felt rough.

But it was sunwarm, and she was cold.

“You’re going to cause a riot on Olympus,” Hermes said, grinning.

“As she should,” Ares said, carefully gathering her hair back from her face. She looked up at him—at red eyes, at storm dark skin. He was still so large.

He smiled for her; it made his eyes crinkle at the corners.

She had hands.

She reached up, cupped his face as she had wanted all that time ago, as she had always wanted, and kissed him. Clumsy, without any of the grace she would one day have; it was so terribly cliche, so terribly romantic, but his hands slipped down from her hair, wrapped her in his arms as his heart sang that tune she loved and loves best in all creation.

She indulged; she rather felt she had earned it.

When she pulled back, Ares looked dazed, his pulse at peace. There was joy howling in him; the ocean in his chest glowed gold and home. She would always be home, so long as he kept that ocean for her.

Has always been home, with him.

“Hello, darling,” she said. “I missed you.”

Ares grinned, wide and lazy enough to show the sharpest of his teeth. He adjusted the blanket around her shoulders, smoothed her hair once more.

“Your war is nearly grown,” Ares said. “I thought it might make a fitting celebration of your rebirth.”

“I look forward to it,” she sighed, and rested against his chest.

She would need to learn to walk. To move like this. She would need to remember this shape, grow comfortable in it before she tried changing it but, as Aphrodite looked at Hermes and Apollo, as she listened to starsong and sunsong mingle with the heartsong humming against her back, she found she was quite looking forward to it.

She could not tell the future; it was not her gift. And yet, she knew, she knows even still, that she will always choose Ares and Ares will always choose her.

It's a choice, love.

**

It is a terribly tacky thing, indulging in oneself, but tackiness is quite beautiful, too.

**Author's Note:**

> thank you, as ever, for reading <3 i'd love to hear what you liked, even if it's just a keysmash


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